


Flesh and Fur

by malchanceux



Category: Batman (Comics), DC Animated Universe, DCU, DCU (Comics), Red Robin (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Captor Bonding, Dubious Consent, Everyone else is mostly just mentioned, It's mostly just Tim and Ra's actually, Kidnapping, M/M, Oh, Ra's is creepy, Stockholm Syndrome, Supernatural Elements, Tiger!Tim, and Tim just misses his family, can't forget to tag that, shape shifting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-08-21
Updated: 2015-02-08
Packaged: 2017-12-24 04:37:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/935454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/malchanceux/pseuds/malchanceux
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ra’s Al Ghul was known for taking what he wants, whether it be a life or property. People were of no exception.</p>
<p>Or, the one where Tim is a Shifter and Ra’s whisks him away from his family.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The update will be slow--college and real life is a mixin' with my natural procrastination.

 

When something happens in the small village of Gotham, news travels fast from word of mouth. So the very day a strange new man comes to their humble town, everyone knows by mid-afternoon. By nightfall, rumors are told by many of the gentleman in the green cape, and how the Wayne’s welcomed the stranger into their home to shelter him from the night’s bitter cold and hidden dangers.

They say he is an adventurer, and that he is rich.

It is also said he is to be staying for only the night, and that he is heading home to his palace in the mountains; the merchants make plans to set their stalls up quickly, at first light. There is only one good road leading out of Gotham as it is secluded: barred in by forest on all sides, and strangers seldom come. They all but salivate at the prospect of the mysterious man’s supposed heavy pockets, their most expensive merchandise put out in haste and with little care. Money is on the horizon, and by morning their purses could be full.

 

 

 

Tim is hesitant to greet the new comer. At least, not with the same zeal and confidence his older brothers had when Bruce first invites the caped man in. They are human, and he—well—he is not, and though the people of Gotham welcomed Tim with open arms after the Wayne’s took him in, Tim understands that he is not what someone like this Ra’s Al Ghul would expect.

Tim is not prepared for the man to be so kind, however. And if he does not even make an effort to hide his striped ears or tail like his brothers advised? Well, the man takes it in stride and does not shun him. He barely bats an eye. It is strange, but a welcomed reaction to his oddities.

That night Tim and his brothers sleep with Bruce to give the nice stranger a room and bed of his own. Tim smiles contentedly, warmed by their guest’s good company and by the tangled bodies of all his favorite people. He feels loved, and dreams well into the night.

 

 

 

Tim wakes up, unsure why.

It is not unusual—his keen ears pick up on all sorts of things that others don’t. They live in a small village surrounded by rainforest, and so many of the wild creatures are nocturnal; sing into the night. He does not often get a full night of undisturbed sleep.

Tim doesn’t notice anything obvious though, and listens intently; thinks he hears a _thump_ from the kitchen.

Naturally curious, Tim gets up to see. When he finds Ra’s Al Ghul sitting at their modest wooden table sipping a tea he’s never smelt before, he is… apprehensive. Not sure why.

Ra’s offers him a taste of his drink, pours a separate cup in a fine china the Shifter _knows_ does not belong to Bruce. Tim accepts, not wanting to be rude, noting something off about the flavor instantly.

Suddenly the world spins and falls away to black.

 

 

 

When he awakens Ra’s’ captive, he refuses to eat.

He can no longer trust any food or drink offered to him.

 

 

 

 

Tim pulls viciously at the gold collar and elegant chain bolted to the floor. The length gives him free access to the room and every luxury in it, but denies him the door and escape. He glares up at Ra’s—ears flat against his head and tail bristled in contempt. He hates the gilded cage the man has imprisoned him in.

“You can’t keep me here forever.”

“We shall see.”

 

 

 

He tears at blankets, rips pillows to shreds, and shatters a tea set against a wall.

“Nature is not to be trifled with— _I am not to be made some tamed animal!”_

 

 

 

No matter how many times Tim shifts into his true form—his tiger—the collar around his neck accommodates and stays firm. He roars in outrage, throws himself away from the chain in a bout of desperation to break the links.

They stay strong, to spite him, and hold the Tiger bound to his own personal hell.

 

 

 

 “You have to eat, Pet.”

“So you can drug me again? I don’t think so.”

“You will only make yourself sick.”

Tim notes the lack of rebuttal to his accusation. “I said no.”

“You leave me no choice then, Timothy.”

 

 

 

Tim slowly comes back to consciousness with a sore throat and heavy limbs. He distantly feels the base of his ears being scratched, but the pain in his throat over shadows the pleasure the act would usually bring.

“There are, of course, other ways of getting nutrition into your body.”

Tim opens his eyes and finds himself looking up at Ra’s—his head in the older man’s lap. The changeling remembers ninja pinning him down and a needle in his arm, a tube down his throat; his roars and yelps of protest being ignored.

“Keep this in mind, Pet: I do not take kindly to people damaging my things—self-harm is of no exception.”

Fear coils sharp in the pit of Tim’s now full belly, cold and hollow. He is weak here, under the _‘care’_ of the caped man, helpless in a way the Shifter has not felt in _years._ Every touch Ra’s bestows on him, every ‘gift’ or plated delicacy brought to the gilded cage only serves to emphasize Tim’s lack of control.

Tim lays limp in man’s lap. It is not to be mistaken as submission, not by any means, but exhausted and sore, the changeling lets the desolate situation weigh heavy on him as he thinks of home and yearns for his family’s touches.

 

 

 

The next day Ra’s brings with him fresh grapes.

Tim eats them all.

 

 

 

Sometimes Ra’s will stay with Tim for hours.

The first few weeks are nothing more than one sided conversations, the first few months stunted niceties to make time go by faster. But as the day’s drag on, Tim willingly—if grumpily—contributes. The changeling is used to the company of all the creatures of the jungle, his family, and the village; to be alone and in silence is… _not good._ During his time spent with Ra’s, Tim learns to play chess _(of which he is fairly good)_ , and all sorts of different teas _(of which most he actually enjoys)_.

Tim learns things about the man holding him captive, _(leader of the League of Assassins, the Demon Head; a cruel, cruel man)_ and wishes he’d never asked.

 

 

 

Every evening a bath is drawn. A ninja comes, releases his chain from the blot in the middle of the room, and guides him to the bathroom: a room directly parallel to the exit.

It’s useless fighting the ninja, he’s learned, because even though he can overpower one or two—there are five others guarding the hallway that’ll come to secure him. So he lets them be— _for now_ —and lets himself be guided to a smaller, porcelain and stone cage.

The bath is huge, and sometimes filled with different scented bubbles. Of course, there is another bolt, and his range is significantly shortened when in the bathroom.

Tim’s never really enjoyed bathing—getting his fur dry was such a hassle—but the steaming water simply melts him. When he is done, or when the ninja say he may be _finished_ , they dry him. Not one of his fingers is to be lifted when being dried and dressed, not even when Tim snaps and bites and claws in protest. But fighting this is also futile. The ninja will not defend themselves, will simply let Tim sink his fangs into flesh and gouge deep cuts wherever his claws might land.

Most days, the Shifter lets them do as they have been ordered. Sporadically, however, when Tim is in a particularly volatile mood, he will mangle the ninja’s hands and face, so that when their duties are finished they are sent back to their _master_ bloodied and ruined and on the mend for at least a few weeks.

 

 

 

One of the things that Tim hates about his captivity is the clothing he is made to wear.

Silks are nice on his skin, he’ll admit. He likes the feel of it—but it’s just... _so much._ The embroider designs are intricate, the clothing layered, the bindings complicated. Tim is used to simple cotton and sometimes going weeks without a shirt or shoes. He feels confined, beyond that of just the room he is kept. He feels choked, smothered, snuffed, bound.

It takes him until week three to get over his fears of punishment before he strips off several pieces of fine silk until he is left a shirt, sash, and pants.

Ra’s Al Ghul doesn’t reprimand him that evening as Tim thought he would—doesn’t speak a word of his appearance, actually—and the next day when clothes are brought to him, there is a significant drop in weight and number.

Tim isn’t sure if this is a victory.

 

 

 

As he is given lighter clothing—sometimes sleeveless shirts, sometimes shirts that don’t button up the front and expose his belly and chest, sometimes tight pants that don’t restrain and only make it to his knees—he is also given jewelry.

He’s not entirely sure what to do with the gold and silver decorations, he’s never worn jewels of any kind that he can remember. Nevertheless, every day, the same ninja that brings him clothes fastens silvers and golds and rubies and sapphires and emeralds about his body.

Tim looks at himself in the mirror in the bathroom one evening—staring at the glossy jewelry that graces his neck and arms, wrists and ankles. He stares and sees the way his pale skin is flattered, the way they almost demand attention. He doesn’t like it all that much, to be honest.

Tim likes blending in with the background _(like his mother taught him—how to stalk prey)_ and jewelry certainly does not help such endeavors. But the hoops and chains and gems do not bother him per say, as the layered clothes had, and so he leaves them be.

 

 

 

It has been an eternity since Tim was taken from his home.

The room he is kept is windowless, and Tim misses the feel of the Earth—a gust of wind against his skin, soil beneath his bare feet, chilled water against overheated limbs. The energy the creatures of the forest unwittingly gave to him.

But most of all, he misses his family.

They were not _his_ by sense of blood, but _his_ by the sense that, when his mother was poached and skinned, they took in the strange child with the ears and tail of a tiger with barely a blink of an eye.

He misses the way Dick would race him through the trees, or how Jason would prompt him to change forms and scare the villagers and travelers half to death. He misses the way Bruce—distant but loving in his own way—would scold and lecture, but would hide his own smiles and mirth at his children’s antics.

He misses the way his brothers felt around him at night when they slept together, loose limbed and tangled heat. Or taking company from the animals of the forest.

Tim had never wished his family to be anything but what they were before, but in his captivity, Tim wished they had the strength and senses of a tiger like him, so they could take him home.

 

 

 

For several nights Tim dreams of heated bodies lying beside his own, fevered dreams that seem so vivid and _real_ that when he wakes, alone and cold in the sprawling cage Ra’s Al Ghul has put him in, he sobs and cannot stop.

 

 

 

So long Tim has been secluded indoors, without even a window to peer through, the power of the forest begins to drain from his body. Tim begins to withdraw.

Where he had once been willing in conversation, he is silent. Where the rich food Ra’s brought had tasted (grudgingly) splendid, it was now ash on his tongue. Where chess was once a fun pass time, Tim refused to budge a single pawn.

It is when he refuses what he considers his favorite tea that Ra’s intervenes. He reaches over the small table and pets at Tim’s face. The Tiger leans into the hand at first, so starved for touch, but remembers who he is with and turns away with a forced indifference.

He thinks of the way Bruce used to press his hand tentatively at Tim’s cheek whenever he’d cry, use his thumb to wipe away tears, and suddenly the changeling’s stomach is a black hole.

His ears fall and he can feel his eyes water up, but he refuses to cry.

“Why won’t you let me go home?” It slips out of his mouth, sad and pathetic. He hadn’t bothered asking in a very long time, but now it suddenly seemed so… overwhelming. That he couldn’t leave the Demon’s hold, that he _couldn’t_ see his family.

Ra’s smiles—not smug, not a smirk, not even cruelly—it’s warm, genuine in its gentleness; knowing. Ra’s stands from his chair and picks Tim up from his own, coddling him in his arms like he weighs nothing, cradling the Tiger’s head on his shoulder even as the boy puts up the pretense of a struggle.

The Demon lays them both down on the bed, holding Tim close and wrapping them both up in fine silk sheets. Tim squirms, tries to push the man away. The tears are unrelenting now, a constant stream of shame. He uses his claws and teeth to try and gain ground, to move out of reach of the very dangerous man holding him captive. Throughout it all, Ra’s holds fast, soothing murmurs slipping like an oil slick from his lips.

Tim isn’t sure how long they go on like that, just knows that by the time he stops struggling to get away there is blood stains on the sheets and teeth marks marring the Demon Head’s body. Ninja come to collect the tea and glasses, to make sure their Master is okay—Tim hides in Ra’s arms then, squirms nearer until he is as close as he can get, taking refuge in large arms and a warm body, tucking his tear stained cheeks into the crook of the man’s neck, snuffling and indignant. Smothered and soothed.

When hands card through his hair and scratch his ears— _like Dick, like Jason, like Bruce used to_ —Tim tenses and thinks about digging his nails into Ra’s sides, about biting at the man’s throat until he cannot breathe.

Instead, the young Shifter relaxes into the touch, and soaks up as much comfort as he can get greedily.

 

 

 

“You need to understand Timothy: I did not choose you at random,” Ra’s speaks once Tim has calmed down—is drifting at the precipice of sleep. “And though I am a man guilty of many things, impulse is not one of them. I knew of you before I stayed in your family’s home in Gotham.”

Tim wants to ask when it was, exactly, that Ra’s had first seen him then. Certainly, Ra’s Al Ghul was not a man easily forgotten.

Rhythmic hands have him falling fast asleep instead, and for once, when he dreams of deliciously shared body heat, he wakes to the same feeling.

 

 

 

For the days that follow that evening, things between Ra’s and Tim are slightly different.

When they drink tea, the Demon Head pulls Tim into his lap.

When they play chess, Tim’s tail will flick and flutter at the man’s feet—wrap around a calf or ankle.

When night comes, Tim is almost always curled around Ra’s Al Ghul’s side.

On the days that Ra’s is absent Tim is cold and lonely and frustrated—that is when Tim thinks of his family once more, and is horrified with himself and his behavior towards his captor.

 

 

 

For a while there is a lull. Tim’s temper is exhausted, and for a string of uncountable days the Shifter and Demon go on with a mutual understanding that no matter what, the Shifter will not be appeased, and that the blood drawn and the bites left behind are the price Ra’s will have to pay if he wishes to continue his close proximity. However, time and time again, Tim allows the man to scoop him up and care for him like some precious gem. An even trade, the Demon had commented one evening. Silently—touched starved and fangs sheathed in the man’s bold, wandering hands—Tim had agreed.

It is at the peak of this lull that a wandering spider sneaks into the League’s hold and spreads death like a cancer.

The Tiger is curled up on a pile of pillows reading when he hears— _feels_ —the first explosion. The walls rattle ominously, and the air holds a scent Tim has not smelt in a long while: the scent of _death_.

Chained as he is, there is nothing he can do other than pace. The explosions are far and few between, and seem to be coming from a good distance away, but the sound of metal on metal grows louder, and the scent of blood stronger. Whatever is happening outside the Tiger’s cage walls is coming closer.

It seems like an eternity before a ninja comes all but crashing into his room, panting and bleeding from the gut. Tim suspects— _prays_ —he’s being moved, being unbound and taken away from all the gore, but the moment the ninja steps toward him, a scantily clad woman comes from behind, touches his maskless face, and the ninja convulses to the floor: dead.

Fear grips Tim’s heart in a vise.

“So you’re what the mighty Ra’s Al Ghul has been keeping under lock and key. Interesting,” She steps over the fresh corpse and moves slowly into the room. “I had been anticipating a lot of things, but a kitty-cat whore wasn’t one of them.”

Tim bristles at that, bares his teeth and let’s his fear—his instinct for self-preservation, to fight—take over. He is stuck with this woman no matter what he does; there is no getting away—not with the collar around his neck.

“What’s the matter, Ra’s got your tongue?”

Tim slowly backs way as the woman continues to close in. He has faced many beasts in the jungle, and he knows from the woman’s scent that she is poisonous, and knows by the corpse behind her that it is quick; ruthless—a demonic spider bite. Outside his gilded cage, Tim would have heeded his mother’s early teachings of _avoiding_ such creatures. But without a choice, he waits in offense.

“Still not gonna talk? Boring. I’ll just kill you then—move on to bigger and better prey.”

The woman attacks, quick as a snake and precise as one too.

Tim, drained with how long he’s been away from the forest, is not fast enough to evade.

He throws himself to the side in a bid to avoid a sure death, but the woman’s hand grabs him around the throat and tosses him across the room. The skin exposed to her—the deathly wrong poison that makes up her _being—_ burns. The effects are immediate and pain shoots through Tim’s whole body from the neck like a lightning strike. He doesn’t register hitting the floor when he lands awkwardly, knocking the wind out of his lungs. Doesn’t notice anything except the blazing agony.

It seems like forever before his eyes can focus and register the woman again, standing not feet from him, looking pissed. Her hands ball into fists as she stalks closer and Tim—

Tim reacts out of instinct and panic.

One moment he’s withering on the floor, dying surely, the next he’s on top of the woman—the wandering spider—digging his fangs into her throat. As a tiger, he growls and rips with a strength Tim had not realized he still possessed. Blood fills his mouth but it is _off:_ does not taste metallic but like rotting flesh and Tim heaves, gags, and loses everything in his stomach right next to his gurgling would-be assassin.

His senses are assaulted by the smell of venom and death, not-right-blood and his own puke—he gags again as he stumbles away from the dying woman, but there is nothing left in him to throw up. He foams at the mouth—his aching, _burning_ mouth—and Tim can feel the poison in the spider’s blood, in her very touch, rush through his system. Somehow he manages to drag himself to a corner, as far from the woman as his chain and collar will permit.

He does not pass out as he had hoped, and he is in too much pain to sleep. Instead the Tiger lays in agony and watches the world fade through a crescendo of dizzying colors and loops and spins. He hears a god awful whimpering wash over the room, and only realizes it is him when he connects it to the barb-wire vibrations in his throat. They are strangled and low and the noise of an animal dying.

Tim only wishes death would come quicker.

_Years_ seem to pass before more ninja pour into the room, swords drawn and uniforms disgruntled. They come to him, but in his state Tim only sees a threat through his lizard mind and growls—bares teeth against the pain. The ninja keep their distance.

The whimpers turn to silence as even that involuntary function becomes too strenuous for Tim’s exhausted body. Other than an involuntary twitch from an agitated muscle, the Tiger lays limp; almost blessedly unconscious.

That is when Ra’s Al Ghul arrives.

Tim has time to see a blur of green come towards him, loud orders being echoed through his hazy mind, before darkness finally takes him.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edited chapter one btdubs. Nothing major, just updated my shitty grammar.

When Tim wakes, his body feels hot and filled with led. His eyes open slowly, almost refusing him the right, and when his lids finally peel away the light is blinding. He scrunches his eyes, groans, and tries to curl into himself. Cool, hard metal slips across his fur and seeps into scorching skin, easing the burn that seems almost bone deep.

“Hush, Pet,” a smooth voice soothes. “You are safe.”

Arms pull at him, support his head on firm flesh. He hears the beat of a steady heart, can almost feel as it pumps life beneath skin. Tim tries once more to open his eyes, but everything is blinding light and blurring shapes—he cannot focus, and his efforts only bring on a headache.

The Shifter lets out a low groan instead, the sound a lazy rolling thunder deep in his ribcage. He thinks for a moment he might be getting better, as the agony from before has lessened significantly. It’s when he forces his eyes to obey him, to take the strain of light, that he sees something is very, _very_ wrong.

Tim’s head rests cradled in Ra’s’ arm while the other pets slowly over his flank. For a moment Tim does not process that there is a problem, but steadily he realizes that he cannot feel the Demon’s gentle touch. Besides the suffocating heat that has engulfed his body, Tim can feel nothing at all in his hind legs or chest. He tries to shift one of his back feet.

Nothing happens.

Tim does not panic, not yet. He lets his gaze struggle across the room, takes in the hard stone and polished marble and stainless steel that surrounds him. Ra’s sits on the hard metal slab Tim’s body is draped across, back leaning on the natural cave wall behind him as he supports the Shifter’s head. Beside them are whirling machines with tubes and wires—the Tiger sees that they are connected to him. Blood leaving his body, blood returning to his body; a clear liquid he cannot identify is being fed into him by an IV.

There are other people in the room, more ninja than Tim can ever recall seeing all at once—twenty, perhaps—and men and woman in white coats walk restless paces from machines to papers to vials to needles to computers and back again.

“I am dying,” he rasps, to no one in particular. In the jungle he had seen death on a regular basis. It was no foreign concept, no mystery. Tim was afraid, yes, but his mother had done her best with the time they had together to get him used to the idea of passing. To understand that it was natural; as natural as anything could be.

“You will not,” Ra’s says sternly, looking down at him with hard eyes. Tim remembers what the man had said months ago, about ruining things that were _‘his’._ An amused rumble rolls through the Shifter’s chest.

“Nature is not to be trifled with,” Tim hisses weakly, “I told you that when you first took me, do you remember?”

“I do,” the Demon says, his face, if possible, becoming colder.

“What is death, Ra’s, but nature’s whim?”

“You will not die,” is the older man’s only reply.

They sit in silence then, while Tim’s vision blurs and clears, pain coming and going; medications stalling the inevitable.

“Excuse me, Ra’s—er, uh, Mr. Al Ghul,” a nervous woman fidgets at Tim’s feet, a clipboard gripped to her chest, a piece of her long, curly brown hair caught in the corner of her blocky glasses. “You—you requested an update every quarter hour. I—uh—”

“What have you found?” the Demon growls. The girl, despite her timid appearance and her nervous ticks, does not seem phased by Ra’s’ temper. An unusual woman. Though Tim supposes someone like the man who wanted to keep a Shifter as a pretty ornament would not employ a _usual_ staff.

“Nothing concrete. The subject’s—uh, your—condition remains the same. No luck with cleaning his—your—blood via dialysis. The poison is spreading much too quickly for that—it’s only slowed the organ failure. We’re keeping you hydrated with the IV, but again, it is only stalling the poisons effects,” the woman rattles it all off like a grocery list, head bobbing between Ra’s and Tim, uncertain who to refer to, “The others want to use more medications—larger doses. They think they can flush out the poison if they put enough into his— _your_ —system all at once.”

“You say ‘they’, Reba, what is your opinion?”

“Well, you didn’t hire me for my medical expertise,” she says, brazen and sarcastic, “We all know that. You hired me because I studied local mythos before I got my medical license, because I have written books and papers and journals on what I’ve found in the jungles here.”

“She’s basing her theories off _fairytales_ , sir!” One of the men laughs from Tim’s peripheral. The doctors are split on the treatment. Arguing over how to pry Death’s fingers from the Shifter’s body.

“A fairytale lay here, on your patients table. Laugh at my life’s work all you want, Doctor Rike, but what you all scoff at has already been proven.”

“Enough,” Ra’s says, voice even but the doctor’s startle as thought he had screamed. The Demon lays Tim’s head unto the table gently, standing tall and angry, “I have little patience for your squabbling—Reba, speak quickly, what are your _theories?_ ”

“Uh—I—the Shifter’s are known on this continent as protectors of nature. Animals, plants—even humans have fallen under their care. I’ve studied these supernatural creatures since my freshman year at Harvard, and I’ve noticed patterns with them. One of which is habitat. You would think that in modern times Shifter’s would be well known, they hardly put effort into hiding past their own preference for a life of solidarity. People that live near the jungles know them well, their lives saved by them before, so why not the rest of the world if they are not concealing themselves with purpose?”

“The point, Reba.”

“Right—er—I looked over the files you gave us, the notes your ninja took of _his_ behavior during his… stay, with you. And my theory is that if the Shifter had come into contact with this poison in his jungle, he would be fine. He wouldn’t have fallen so ill. His confinement from the jungles has weakened him.”

“You have _no proof_ of any of this,” Rike interrupts.

“I do, in fact,” Reba adjusts her glasses and gestures to the cave walls around her, “in here we are closer to nature—there is steel and concrete, yes, but this was once simply a cave full of bugs and bats and plants. When we moved him from his rooms to here, he gained enough strength to gain consciousness and remain coherent. The closer he is to his jungle, the more strength will be returned to him. The Shifter could heal all on his own.”

“You forget that we started him on our treatments the moment we got our hands on him,” Rike argues, “How do you know what we put him on isn’t what’s making him better? How can you say your treatment is the key any more definitively than the rest of us?”

“I—”

 _“Enough!”_ Ra’s hisses, “All of you are to leave, _now.”_

The doctors’ pause in their duties, startled and unsure, but one look at the Demon Head’s icy glare have even Reba and Rike quickly following orders. The ninja wait a beat longer, until the scientists have filed out before them, and leave the room with a last, sweeping gaze over the room. In their absence, sharp beeps and grating whirls permeate the room.

“What will you do, Ra’s?” Tim asks, pulling himself up and putting tentative weight on his forearms. His back legs still refuse to move, “How will you fight the inevitable?”

“You speak as if you do not _want_ to live—or do you not understand how grave your situation is? When I found you, you could hardly _breathe._ There is no cheating death here, not now.”

“You mean as you do, great _Demon’s Head_.”

“If I thought for a moment the Lazarus Pits would save you, you would be drowning in it by now. I have seen what the Pits can do to things of your nature. It is not an option.”

“Perhaps Ra’s,” Tim growls, amusement gone, anger taking its place, “it is that I do not fear death so fiercely as you. For one to grasp so desperately at life, they must have something precious keeping them in the mortal plane. What do I have left, Ra’s? What have you not taken from me?”

Foam drips from the Shifter’s maw, blood tainting it pink. The sclera of Tim’s eyes mimic the color. The Shifter’s body is slowly failing him, from fever to internal bleeding. None of the drugs nor treatments are working, merely slowing the deterioration. Perhaps Reba was right.

Ra’s growls in frustration and turns sharply from the boy. Tim was _his_ , from the moment the Demon’s Head had first laid eyes on him. The tiger was destined to live under his control. He would not be denied because fate had seen it fit for a second rate assassin to stumble across one of Ra’s’ most coveted treasures.

Suddenly, an alarm is going off. Ra’s spins on heel to see Tim once more collapsed on the table, heart monitor flat lining. The doctors swarm back into the cavern, ignoring Ra’s as though he were not one of the most deadliest men in the world, rushing past him to their dying patient. Rike takes the lead, steam rolling the other men and women and yelling to triple the doses of everything they’ve been pumping into Tim. It’s a mad scramble, chaos. Ra’s knows this will not do.

“Stop!” he says firmly, “Take him off dialysis and remove the IV. Prepare a gurney. We are taking him outside.”

 

 

 

Tim is born in the midst of the dry season. Wild fires were starting at all ends of the forest, too large and destroying too much to be of any true use to the environment. But from the moment he leaves the womb—at the spark of his very first cry—the sky clouded with something other than smoke, and it _poured._ For three days straight it rained, bringing new growth and rejuvenation where there had only been the burning husk of a once great forest.

 _“You came into this world protecting the forests, as Shifters have been doing for generations,”_ his mother had told him once, _“You came into this world wielding the elements like a blade and shield.”_

 

 

 

Tim is seven moons old and since his birth his mother has kept him close, shadowed him always, and steered him clear of any dangers. Janet teaches him what predators he might stumble upon when he is older, the differences and uses each and every native plant has in their forest, and how to care for the animals that live, by default, under their protection. She teaches him how to better control his power over the rains, his rule over fire, and his authority over lesser creatures.

Tim’s mother tells him horror stories of Man, speaks of their coltish attempts to rein control over the elements as they were never meant to. How fire dances at their fingertips, and becomes vicious in their hands. How mighty rivers become damned and whole ecosystems are slaughtered at their leisure. Janet tells him about hunting for _sport_ , and how Tim must always be careful when in the presence of Man, lest he become their next won _game._

Tim is seven moons old when he learns what it feels like to be _hunted._

It is the rainy season, and the sky is dark though the sun is high. The river is running higher than the young Tiger has ever seen it, and he laughs and play-growls in the shallows as he chases ducks, fish, and his own sopping wet tail. Janet smiles from a distance, indulgent but keeping as dry as possible high up in a tree.

A branch snaps, her ears twitch and hackles rise: they are not alone in the forest. She stills and listens, ears keen, but hears nothing but the falling rain. Her nose is nearly useless now for the same reason.

“Tim,” Janet calls, sliding down from her branch, “Tim, time to go.”

The young Shifter looks up from his playing, confused but compliant. In the forest, disobedience could lead only to injury. He takes a step toward his mother, cold river water lapping at his belly, but freezes when a shadow appears from behind her.

“ _Ma’ma!”_ he screams, and Janet spins on heel, a roar ripping past her bared fangs. Blood flies and a gruff, dangerous looking man collapses into the mud. More rustling from the bush, branches snapping and puddles splashing; dozens of booted feet rushing towards them.

“Tim,” Janet hisses, body rippling and bones cracking as she shifts, _“Run!”_

And Tim obeys.

He never sees his mother alive again.

 

 

 

Tim runs for days. Aimless, he weaves circles around the forest he was born to protect with tears streaming down his cheeks and blood crusted under his nails. The men were strong, well-armed, and great in number. They had been prepared for the _prey_ they were hunting. Between himself and his mother, most of the hunters are dead.

 _Most_.

What was left, Tim knows, claimed his mother’s life.

And skin.

He can smell her blood in the air, the scent unique as any of his kind, and the wind permeates suffering and death. Tim thinks of the small game animals the young Shifter would come across from time to time, stuck in the metal traps Man had set. Sometimes they were still alive when he’d find them, stinking of fear and pain and a desperation to live, no matter how hopeless their injuries left them. His mother had showed him how to snap their necks cleanly, so that their agony would be put to rest, and then set free.

Tim knows that somewhere in the jungle of trees and streams and lesser animal life he calls home, his mother’s corpse is being desecrated. For those few days Tim cannot eat, cannot sleep, and cannot stomach the thought of abandoning the forests and forsaking his mother out of fear.

On the fifth day, belly cramping and body shaking from exertion, Tim catches scent of the hunters. Near delirious, he follows the strong smells of burning wood, sweat, blood, and gun powder. Their camp, he realizes, is what he’s heading toward. The very thing he’d been trying to avoid.

When he gets there, he counts six men—four bloodied and nursing nasty blows his mother had dealt before her death, the others restlessly cleaning their guns and sharpening their knives, as though preparing to go out on the hunt once more. As though the agony they had caused the forest was not yet enough.

Tim thinks about everything Janet had ever taught him to stay alive, how, as he took those few bold steps into the camp, he was ignoring every lesson ever given. He shifts with a low, furious growl, large paws hitting the mud in a wild sprint, teeth bared like blades and eyes glowing like fire.

Tim’s body is heavy from exhaustion but he calls upon the forest for strength. Birds screech from their perches, tigers roar from the shadows, deer raise their proud antlers to the sky—the fauna and flora cry out in benediction, scream for balance in a show of loyalty to the paranormal creatures that have watched over them for years and years to come. It is a plea for vengeance, for justice. Blood for blood. The way of the animal kingdom.

It takes but moments for all the men to die. The stench of their blood stains the air and taints the earth beneath their cooling corpses, but Tim ignores their last trespasses. On shaky legs, he goes to his mother’s skinned corpse. The young Shifter ignores the pains of his body and the sickened twisting of his stomach; his duty is not yet done. Silent tears stream down his face as he drags his mother through the forest, to the clearing Janet had birthed him not so many years ago, and builds a pyre.

Their people are of traditions. Isolated, Tim had learned everything he needed to know about their kin through his mother. In the darkness of night, she had once uttered how the passing of a Shifter is to be dealt with.

 _“Leave their body where it has fallen,”_ she had murmured into his skin, their bodies entwined, limbs tangled, _“Let the Earth take back the life which it has given. This is what Shifter’s see as an honorable death.”_

But there was no honor to be found here, his mother’s skinless body mangled and in pieces. One more thing the hunters have robbed her of, even after death. Tim cannot bear the thought of leaving her in the forest like that, humiliated and stripped of her fur. Tim burns her body where their journey together had begun instead. He turns his tear streaked face away in shame, the fire turning tragedy to ashes. The wind will take her, he thinks, and though not by the traditions she so closely held to her heart, she would return to the Earth that had created her.

The forest is darkened by heavy clouds, when it is all said and done. It rains, then, the turmoil in the sky reflecting that of the young Shifter in mourning.

The rains do not stop for a very long time.

 

 

 

 

The scent of mud and ozone comes to Tim like a gentle caress. The smells mingle at the back of his throat, coating his taste buds like honey, soothing a terrible ache. Sensations come to him slowly, one by one—the feel of cold, refreshing rain drenching his coat, the sound of muted monkey chatter and of water droplets bombarding the forests canopy. They bring him to the surface of his conscious, out of a blank abyss, at the rhythm of nature’s leisure.

Tim’s eyes flutter open. There is a small lizard by one of his front paws, hiding from the weather under a leaf. He will drown there, as the forest floor often floods during storms as heavy as the one beating down on them now. Static rushes over Tim, plucking over his damp fur, as bones crack and snap numbly and his body reforms. _Shifts._

With a shaking hand the tiger reaches out for the tiny reptile. It does not run from his touch—it knows it has nothing to fear from him. Tim’s pale fingers wrap gently around the lizard, pulling it to his chest for warmth and to shield it from the rain. It nuzzles into the soft flesh of his palm. Tim furrows his brows—his hands had always been rough from callouses; skin worn and tough from a life in the jungle…

He sits up, unabashedly nude, and sees what his dulled senses had not picked up before. There are ninja all around, spotting the forest—so obvious in their drenched, black uniforms. Their eyes are keen through the mist of the rain, periodically scanning the woods for danger and making sure their master’s _pet_ stayed put.

Tim’s ears pin to his head in ire. Ra’s Al Ghul stands before him, face a mask of neutrality, poised regal despite his cape being soaked through.

“I am surprised at you, Ra’s,” Tim drawls, “I knew what that strange doctor spoke to be true, but I never thought you’d bare me to the light of day again. Not willingly, at least.”

Ra’s shifts minutely, turning his gaze out to the forest. Stubborn. “You went into cardiac arrest and your insides were quickly rotting into a slop. I don’t think that would fit into the definition of ‘willing’.”

“You know what this means, don’t you?”

The Demon’s Head regard him with a critical eye, “You are going to try and escape.”

“I’m not going to _try_ , Ra’s. I _am_.”

“We shall see.”

There is a heavy silence then; a thick pressure in the air, smothering their voices. All the same, there was nothing left to be said. Tim had drawn his line in the sand the moment he woke up in his gilded cage, and now, outside for the first time in _months,_ Ra’s Al Ghul had shown his hand. None of the ninja would aim to kill. The same could not be said for the Shifter.

Slowly, Tim rose to his feet. The energy of the flora and fauna all around him flooded into his body—it must have been an endless stream since Ra’s had brought him outside his base. The Shifter moved the lizard to his shoulder, encouraged it to tangle its claws into his hair. He would need his hands free for this—his claws and fangs bared. He would _not_ be returning to the Demon Head’s lair. He refused to be a polished trinket any longer.

A ninja shifted uneasily at Tim’s left, foot squelching in the mud. Another slowly began to unsheathe his sword. The tension was getting tighter, strained, about to snap.

Between heart beats Tim leapt forward, speed unnatural. Arterial spray mixed with the rain running down the Shifter’s body as he slayed the first ninja, shattering the stand still. Like he had flipped a switch, assassins jumped forward.

Their numbers were many, but Tim would not return captivity alive. He refused even the idea. He would escape the Demon Head’s men, or he would die trying.


End file.
